But
there’s been an unending stream of news and opinion pieces on both sides of the
fence over the past few years about the refugee situation: the
welcoming, the hatred, the support, the blame, the integration, the isolation, the
resentment.
A handful
of success stories are being held up to counter the accusations about an increase in violent acts and anti-Semitism which are being
attributed to refugees.
 |
| image from prx.org |
Once
explorers and colonists arrived in the U.S., American racial diversity had begun. Native Americans, Africans, whites, Mexicans,
Spaniards, there were plenty of shades to go around. Germany, meanwhile, had a population
that was largely white until the early 20th century.
While
Americans have struggled (and continue to struggle) with the fallout of Native
American massacres and relocations, enslaved Africans and their disenfranchised descendants, Chinese rail labor, and
Japanese internment camps, Germany’s melting-pot woes have been comparatively brief
and, though devastating, limited in scope.
This is not to pit one country's bad deeds against the other's, or to let
Germany off the hook by any means. But it’s helpful for me to remember these different histories when I
see articles that say Germans don’t “get” American racism or why blackface is a
big deal or don’t understand that procedures they’ve described are, in fact,
racial profiling, or assume every brown person they see is new to
the country and without means.
All I can do is honor
who I am and my history, learn from and try to affect the circle of people around
me, and hope there’s a rippling effect.
I guess that’s all any
of us can hope to do.
“For peace to reign on Earth, humans must evolve into new beings who have learned to see the whole first.” ― Immanuel Kant
This is my final post in
honor of Black History Month, focusing on race and diversity in Germany. If you
missed my previous posts, you can find them here:
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